Not Another Apocalypse
by hiholly123
Summary: Nobody wants another apocalypse, but when Percy Jackson and the Kane siblings meet, the world might be in trouble. However, the end of the world in the universe of the Greek and Egyption gods isn't the only thing wrong, because a few demigods and our favorite magicians are seeing ghosts. *Second in The Crossover Collection Series* Note: -EVENTUALLY BECOMES A MULTI-FANDOM CROSSOVER-
1. Chapter 1

**Hello all, I'm back! And super excited to post the first chapter of Not Another Apocalypse. I'm considering re-naming it (I literally just came up with the name XD), but for right now it'll work.**

**If you haven't read the first in the The Crossover Collection series, titled Only the Beginning, I recommend you do. It's a Doctor Who/Avengers crossover, and I've gotten a really good response to it, and it was really fun to write. However, it's not necessary to read Only the Beginning to read this (hopefully good) story. And it's not necessary to read this story in order to read The Crossover, which, for new readers, is going to be the finale to this series, and I'm always obsessing over it. If any of you are interested in knowing what that's about, see my profile. Thank you. :)**

**Last thing I want to mention is that we're going to say that soon after The Last Olympian happened, The Red Pyramid occured. Also, this takes place before The Lost Hero, so Percy is still present in New York. And this is also between The Red Pyramid and The Throne of Fire. And we'll say that the Kanes' trainees have not arrived yet.**

**Oh, one more thing. I use WordPad to write these chapters, and that program unfortunately doesn't have spell check. So I might sometimes misspell words. If you guys see any mistakes, let me know and I'll fix it ASAP.**

**With that out of the way, let's begin! :D**

* * *

Percy Jackson was being chased by a monster.

For most people, this would involve a lot of running and screaming and calling for help. For Percy, it was mostly swinging at the creature with his sword, Riptide, and muttering Greek curses. And of course there was running, too.

The monster happened to be a she, or at least that's what Percy assumed it was. She certainly looked female, and human, except for the serpent tail that set off all of his 'monster alarms.'

"You cannot run from me, child," she hissed. "I am Lamia."

Percy had no idea what the significance of her name was, but it had to have something to do with eating kids, because that's what she'd been attempting to do before he'd interrupted her. She'd been creeping up on a little girl with blond hair in pigtails, looking ravanous, but had been cut off by none other than Percy Jackson. Who had goaded her into following him.

And now the serpent lady was chasing him in the direction of Brooklyn. And it indeed had become more of a chase than follow in the past few minutes. Percy reflected that maybe he just should have gone at her right when he'd found her rather than swinging his sword in her general direction and shouting insults at her until she ran at him. That might have been a better idea, even if there were mortals present. He had no doubt that they'd have just run away anyway, and then he wouldn't be dealing with this now.

He stopped running for a moment to slash at her. She dodged the blow and hissed at him, but didn't stop coming. And she was fast.

"Crap," he said, and then whirled around and fled with Lamia right on his heels. He knew that he probably should have just faced her right then and there, but there had been mortals coming out of shops and staring at him and the last thing he needed was casualties. Two or three mortals, like with the little girl and her parents, could get away. But if there were too many people around, then someone was bound to get hurt. Percy didn't think he'd be able to deal with that at the moment. He got out of there.

He entered Brooklyn then, and felt a sudden, gut-wrenching chill. A wrongness, a bad taste in his mouth. He actually froze in place with a hard swallow, and Lamia nearly bowled him over. Luckily, she just knocked into him a little and sent him stumbling slightly as she whooshed on past, finally skidding to a stop a few yards away.

"Demigod," she snarled, baring her teeth and looming over Percy. He noticed with a blink of surprise that she was slowly becoming more snake-like and less human. He readied his sword, just about to lop her head off-

"_Ha-di_!" a girl's voice exclaimed, and then Percy was coated with gold dust.

"Oh gods," he gagged, and hurriedly brushed himself off. It sure beat splattering guts, but it was still gross to have all over you, and Percy was not pleased. When he was suitably cleaned off, he readied Riptide (just in case) and stared at the girl who had apparently killed the monster.

She looked about thirteen, chewing gum and grinning at Percy as she spun a staff-like thing in one hand. Percy noticed earbuds peeping out of one of the pockets in her jacket. She looked wealthy. There was an older boy next to her, a couple of years younger than Percy, with dark skin and curly hair. He was gripping a weirdly-shaped sword thing.

"So," the girl said. "No 'thank you'?"

"Uh, thanks," Percy offered, lowering his sword. "But I could have handled it. How did you...?"

She ignored his question. "You're obviously not from the House of Life, or you'd be chasing after us by now. Right?"

The son of Posiedon was confused. "I don't think-"

The girl continued to ignore him. "You're probably not a magician at all, are you? Because the House of Life made it very clear that we were their enemies. And _that,_" here she gestured triumphantly to Riptide, "is not a magician's weapon. So where are you from?" Percy noticed that a British accent, although slightly faded, was evident in her words.

"I came from my summer camp," he said. It's not like it wasn't the truth, anyway. He had. Although, he had left out the part where his summer camp was a demigod training site, led by the centaur Chiron. Oh well. "What about you? I mean, you're not American."

"No," the older of the two put in, "she's not. I am, though. And we live here." He motioned behind him, to the rest of Brooklyn. "You?"

Percy jabbed a thumb over his shoulder. "Manhattan," he replied, and then pointed to the girl's staff. "Um. What's that?"

She frowned and then quickly hid the staff behind her. "None of your business," she snapped.

"I'm Carter, by the way," the boy beside her added, nudging her slightly and provoking a scowl. "This is my sister, Sadie."

"You're related?" Percy blurted, surprised.

Now Carter looked annoyed, and Sadie's expression had become angrier. "Unfortunately," Carter said. His sister elbowed him, and he tried to muffle a squeak of pain. Percy noted with a bit of confusion that his sword-thing had disappeared.

"Who are you, then?" Sadie demanded, crossing her arms, apparently forgetting to hide her staff in her annoyance.

"Percy Jackson."

"So, Percy Jackson, do you often play with golden swords at your camp?"

"Actually, yeah."

Sadie scoffed. "Really? I'm not buying it." She sauntered forward and pointed her staff at him with a smirk. "Tell me the truth."

"Sadie," Carter warned, and took her staff from her. She smacked him in response and stole it back. "Sorry," he told Percy.

"What is that thing?" the demigod asked, looking warily at Sadie's staff.

"You're not telling us the truth," the girl said. "Why should we tell you?"

Percy recalled her earlier words. "You were talking about magicians," he said. "Did you mean the magic-trick kind, or the children-of-Hecate kind of magician?"

Carter frowned at the last part of the question, and answered, "We're, uh, the magic-trick kind."

Somehow, Percy extremely doubted this.

Sadie caught his expression and gave Carter a glare. "You're a rubbish liar," she told him, a scowl marring her features and her accent coming through more clearly.

Percy took a deep breath before he spoke, feeling like he was about to step over the edge of a cliff with the words. "So you're...demigods?"

Both siblings turned to stare at him. "Whats?" Sadie wondered, blinking.

"That's Greek mythology," Carter filled in for her. "The children of gods." At her confused expression, he sighed and added, "Sometimes gods would get together with mortals, and a demigod would be born. Half human, half god."

"Er, yeah," Percy said, not sure what else to do. He was starting to worry that maybe Carter and Sadie weren't really demigods at all. Annabeth would flay him alive.

"That's stupid," Sadie scoffed, shooting a glare in Percy's direction. "Now I have a question for _you_, Percy Jackson. I thought it would be dumb to ask before, but now I'm getting suspicious. Are you a magician?"

"No!" Percy protested, capping Riptide and shoving it into his pocket as he spoke. Oh gods, he thought. "I'm a demigod! What are magicians?"

Sadie looked like she would make a smart remark as a comeback, but Carter spoke up before her, to Percy's relief. "Wait," he said to Percy, and then turned to his sister. "Remember what Amos said before? When we were first coming here? About Manhattan?"

Percy was starting to feel uncomfortable. At least now he wasn't carrying his weapon around like Sadie was. However Carter had gotten rid of his without Percy noticing, Sadie either couldn't do it, or couldn't be bothered to.

"Other gods," Sadie mused, and then they both faced Percy once again, at the same time. He could see the resemblance, now. "So, there are Greek gods, then?"

"Yeah," the demigod answered. He wasn't liking how complicated this was becoming. "You said other gods...?"

Carter was nothing but apologetic and excited as he stepped forward. "Yes, the Egyption ones. Sadie and I have the blood of the pharaohs, and we can do magic."

"Are there any other gods I should know about?" Percy asked. He felt exceedingly stupid, and sort of like Annabeth should know this type of thing. She would be furious with Chiron - Chiron had to know about it, right?

Sadie, who was not as excited as her brother but still seemed interested, said, "Not that we know of. So you really are a demigod?"

Percy almost felt proud, until the emotion was eclipsed by the gavity of the situation. "Yeah. When you say magicians, then, you mean you can do actual magic."

"Yeah," Sadie said. "My geek of a brother just said that, didn't he?"

"Sorry."

"It's fine," Carter piped in. "Here." Then he said something like, "_Hequat_," and shortly his sword was back in his hand and he was grinning.

Percy found himself smiling, too. "Cool," he said. "But, uh, what are we going to do? I think Chiron will want to see you."

"_The _Chiron?" Carter burst out, eyes boggling.

"Um, yeah."

"Oh no," Sadie muttered, "he's geeking out."

"Would you mind coming to meet him?" Percy asked, ignoring her. "I don't know what'll happen now that we've met."

Sadie groaned. "Are we talking about an apocalypse? Carter and I are dealing with one already."

"We just finished with one, too," Percy said sympathetically. Apocalypses were never fun stopping, as cool as it was on TV. "But, uh, we won't know unless you guys come to camp with me."

Carter's excitement seemed to be growing even more. "Your camp is a demigod camp?" he questioned, eyes alight.

"Yes. Can we go? Um, please, 'cause they'll be worrying about me-"

Sadie waved him off. "Okay, fine." She looked to Carter. "What about Bast?"

Her brother's excitement decreased slightly. "Oh." Then, to Percy, "Do you mind if we make a stop before we go?"

"No," Sadie sighed before Percy could reply, "I just meant that we need to watch how long we're gone. She'll freak out if she knows we've found out about this. She's a god, she'll know about demigods, right?"

Carter nodded. "I guess. So, Percy, never mind then."

Percy bobbed his head. "Alright." He glanced around and saw that despite the fact that the battle with Lamia had ended a while ago, the mortals were still gone. And Percy thought he heard sirens nearby. "Come on," he urged, beckoning the magicians - he wondered how long it would take him to get used to saying that - and starting off in the direction of camp. "It'll take a little bit, but we can make it there before dark. Probably."

"We'll need to get back home by then," Sadie told him. They hadn't started running or anything yet, but they were still walking pretty quickly. Percy picked up the pace at Sadie's comment.

"It'll be fine," Percy said, hoping. "Besides, this Bast person won't be able to detect you." He glanced at his companions. "Um, she doesn't have a detection spell or something, right?"

"It doesn't matter," Sadie declared, but they were nearly jogging now. "As long as we can come up with something believable, she won't bug us. Right?" She looked to Carter.

"Don't ask me, she's your cat," her brother muttered, a sentence Percy didn't care to decode at the moment. At least the police were behind them now. The teens weren't far enough away that they couldn't hear the officers talking loudly into their radios and wondering why they'd been called if there was nothing there, but they were getting there. As they escaped the police and headed off to Camp Half Blood, there was a recurring thought in Percy's mind. Everytime his new acquaintances spoke, or he could hear them moving behind him, it came to his mind, sending chillds through him like when he'd first stepped foot in Brooklyn.

_What have I started?_

* * *

**Ooh. Hopefully that wasn't horrible. It's probably fine (us writers are very critical of our own work, in case you haven't noticed), but I'd like to know what you all thought. If you liked it, please let me know in the reviews. If you didn't, let me know as well and tell me why. I really appreciate constructive criticism (and I'm sure you all do, too - it makes for better stories), so if you have any of that as well, that would be awesome. If I've made some glaring mistake, it would be super if someone would let me know. Or if I've done pretty well with the whole thing.**

**So anyway, please review with your thoughts. And if you have any questions about this story or The Crossover or even Only the Beginning, drop me a PM and I'll try my best to respond with everything I feel like I can tell you. :)**

**Hopefully I'll update in a few days, but probably next week. (School's starting, though, so...ugh.) I'll try my best to get these written and posted within a week, but we'll see.**

**So long for now.**


	2. Chapter 2

**Well, I'm back. Sorry it's been so long, but school's been getting in the way, and I've finally gotten around to revising a thing I wrote in sixth and seventh grade. And by revising, I mean totally rewriting. Believe me, it's necessary.**

**Anyway, I've gotten a pretty good response to this so far. It's not as public as my Doctor Who/Avengers story Only the Beginning, but I'm pretty happy with the few reviews and stuff I've been getting. That's always nice. I'm not super happy about this chapter, so if it's horrible I'm sorry. But we're still working up to the action, so naturally this chapter and the next are going to be pretty blah. Hopefully not boring, but I wouldn't say riveting, either. I'm crossing my fingers in the hope that it's just me being critical of myself. But please let me know.**

**On with the second chapter! (Finally!)**

* * *

Percy was greeted at the top of the hill by Peleus, the dragon who was currently curled around Thalia's tree and blinking at them.

"Hey," Percy said, and shot the creature a half-smile. He glanced behind him at Carter and Sadie, who were looking at Peleus curiously but seemed otherwise unconcerned. Percy introduced them to the dragon, and then led them down the hill and into camp.

He'd been worried for a minute that the Kanes wouldn't be able to get past the camp's barrier (being from a different set of gods and all), but the siblings crossed through it without a problem, so he figured they might be accepted at least decently by Chiron. Not that the centaur was ever really hostile, but still.

"So," he began, "this is Camp Half-Blood, where demigods come to train." He pointed to the Big House, and the cabins, and was just starting on capture the flag when Annabeth appeared - honestly _appreared_, thanks to her hat - beside him.

"Hey, Seaweed Brain," she said, and then looked at Carter and Sadie. "Are these new campers?"

"Um, no. Uh-"

"I'm Sadie," Sadie interrupted, and shook Annabeth's hand with a smirk. "And this is my dork of a brother, Carter."

Annabeth acknowledged them with a nod, and had accepted Sadie's hand without any resistance, but otherwise didn't speak to them as she addressed Percy again. "But if they're not new campers," she said, and it sounded so much like a protest that Percy wanted to sigh in exasperation, "then why are they here?" Her gray eyes, which had before been cheerful and smiling, were now serious and steely.

"I'll tell you in the Big House," Percy told her, and began walking as he spoke, with her falling in beside him and the Kanes trailing behind them. "I was going to talk to Chiron anyway."

"Percy, what happened?" his girlfriend asked, and although there was concern for him in her voice she sounded primarily curious.

"I don't know," he replied, and he thought that it was kind of a shame that that was true.

They were met on the Big House's porch by Rachel, who was lounging in a lawn chair with a book, and Mr. D and Chiron, who were, as usual, playing pinochle. Chiron appeared to be winning.

"Chiron, I need to talk to you," Percy said. He could sense Carter behind him, moving to get a better look at the camp's activities director.

"What about, Peter?" Mr. D asked snidely as he drank from his Diet Coke.

Percy considered ignoring him, but shook his head and answered, "Um, these kids-" (Sadie protested at that, but was cut off by her brother) "-I found in the city. It's important."

Chiron looked up at him, and must have seen the strain on his face because he nodded and said to Mr. D, "I concede the game. You win."

"Ha," the god of wine sneered, and reset the game. "Come back when you're ready to lose again."

Chiron only smiled slightly in response as he directed the teens inside of the Big House. Rachel had abandoned her book as well, and snuck in after them all.

"Hey Percy," she said. "What's up?"

"I have absolutely no idea," Percy replied. "Maybe another apocalypse. Maybe nothing. Have you gotten any, um, hints about anything?"

Rachel now looked concerned. "Not besides that prophecy we got after the war."

Percy's heart sunk. "This better not be that," he said simply.

Chiron motioned for them all to sit down once they'd reached the ping-pong table usually reserved for council meetings. "Now, Percy, please tell us what's going on."

But the thing was, he wasn't exactly sure how to explain it. "Well," he began, "I was fighting a monster near Brooklyn, and I sort of went in, and then these two," he motioned to the siblings beside him, "dusted it."

Chiron, Percy noticed with a sense of dread, was looking a bit pale now. "Brooklyn, you said?"

"Yeah."

The activities director looked to Carter and Sadie. "What are your names?" he asked politely, but there was clear tension in his voice.

"Sadie and Carter," the youngest declared, crossing her arms defiantly.

"Kane," her brother added. He was looking at Chiron hopefully, and with a good deal of awe.

"Did you just bring them here because you thought you should?" Annabeth asked, her voice a little too steely for Percy to be entirely comfortable. "Or did you actually think it through?"

"Hey," Rachel started, "it was probably the right thing to do." She and Annabeth didn't fight a whole lot anymore, but they had their occasional spats. And this looked like it was shaping up to be one.

"They could be dangerous," Annabeth said. "I'm not saying Percy didn't do the right thing, in the end, but maybe he should have called or-"

Carter interrupted with, "Hey, we're not dangerous, we promise we're here peacefully, we don't mean any harm-"

"We'll mean harm if they lock us up," Sadie griped, cutting him off with a greatly annoyed look on her face.

"We're not planning to imprison you unless you pose a real threat to our safety," Chiron said, sounding as if he planned on lecturing them all, when Percy just decided to forget breaking it carefully or slowly or anything, even if it would spare the Kanes potential jail time.

"They're magicians," the son of Poseidon blurted, and then Chiron's expression noticably darkened, and Percy's gut churned. Sadie shot him a furious, and slightly frightened look, while Carter just watched Chiron with what appeared to be a mix of hope and fear. It was clear that neither of them liked the idea of being prisoners.

Chiron stood up out of his wheelchair, revealing the entirely of himself, causing both Carter and Sadie to move back with wide eyes. Despite their reactions, it wasn't a terribly menacing pose. In fact, Chiron just looked tired. "Percy," he said, "you shouldn't have brought them here."

"I thought you should know they were here!" Percy protested, feeling useless and stupid. He expected Annabeth to be angry with him or scold him, but while she seemed annoyed she wasn't entirely opposing him.

"Okay, we know Percy can be dumb," she said, as if it were an undeniable fact. Percy felt a scowl cross his face when he saw Rachel nod in agreement, and then a blush when she saw him glaring at her. "But maybe he's done a good thing. I don't know how bad magicians are supposed to be," and obviously this irked her, "but maybe it's a good thing they're here. We can keep an eye on them."

Carter shook his head and shot a pleading, slightly angry look at Percy. "We don't mean any harm," he repeated. "If you let us leave, we won't say anything."

"Magicians are of the Egyption gods," Chiron told Annabeth, his face in a somber mask. "They've been unheard of for a while, but the House of Life is dangerous, espcially to demigods."

Annabeth's face hardened into a very serious expression. "Are we looking at war?" she asked.

"Not if you let us go," Carter said.

"Shut up," Sadie muttered. "They're not going to."

"Hold on," Rachel said, breaking up the conversation by waving her arms. "Let's think about this. If Sadie and Carter don't tell anyone about coming here, we won't be in danger from this House of Life, will we?"

Chiron sighed. "I would love to believe that the Kanes would lie to their own kind in order to spare us, but I find that unlikely. It wouldn't do any good anyway. Most don't know this, but entering Camp Half-Blood infuses you with Greek magic, which will be easily detected by most magicians."

"Hey," Sadie offered, "we're actually enemies of the House of Life. They're hunting for us. They hate our guts. And we don't hang around any experienced magicians, really. It's just me and Carter."

Percy suddenly remembered something he'd been trying to ignore because of its strangeness, but had now come to his often wandering attention as something that screamed, VERY IMPORTANT. "What about Bast?" he asked.

Chiron's gaze sharpened, as did Annabeth's, although hers was in pure interest, while his was in worry.

"The Egyptian cat goddess?" Annabeth said. She looked to the Kanes. "You're friends with an Egyptian cat goddess?"

Sadie glared at Percy, and then at Annabeth. Her voice was filled to the brim with irritation when she spoke. It seemed to be her default emotion. "She disguised herself as my cat for years," she mumbled. "I didn't know."

"Bast will know immediately that you've been here," Chiron informed them all. "I'm sorry, children," he addressed Carter and Sadie. "I'm afraid you can't leave."

"They seem trustworthy," Rachel offered to the activities director. "I mean, I don't really know them, but Percy seems to trust them. Maybe Bast won't say anything."

Carter nodded. "I'm sure she won't," he said. "She's on our side."

Chiron slowly shook his head and folded himself back into his wheelchair, looking weary. "I'm afraid we can't risk it," he told them with an apologetic smile. "I suppose I belive you as well, but we've just recovered from one war - we can't risk letting you go and battling through another one."

Carter seemed intriged by Chiron's wheelchair, but immediately snapped his attention away from it when he was spoken to. "We'll have to be released sometime," he said, and his face became taut with anxiety. "Or there's going to be a problem. Bast will..."

"It'll be bad," Sadie assured them.

"They could IM her," Percy suggested. "Tell her not to worry, but that they won't be back for a while." He turned to the Kanes. "You guys, uh, you go on quests, right? Um, missions?"

"Yeah, sometimes," Sadie allowed, clearly curious but trying not to show it.

"Would she be able to detect the Greek magic from an IM?" Annabeth asked Chiron.

He considered. "Most likely not," he decided. "Despite Isis's power, an Iris Message isn't quite potent enough to be noticable if the message is short. It might not be a bad idea. Good thinking, Percy." He gave the demigod a smile before he spoke again. "It would probably be best to send it soon," he said. "Before she becomes anxious and starts hunting you down. Percy, Annabeth, could you show our friends to a place they could contact Bast?" Rachel looked like protesting, before Chiron came over to place a hand on her shoulder and said, "You and I need to have a private conversation."

Percy nodded at Rachel, who gave him a thin smile in return, before he and Annabeth led the siblings out of the Big House and started in the direction of Percy's cabin.

"What's an IM?" Carter wondered. "I mean, it's not a normal IM, I'm guessing."

"You're right, it's not," Annabeth told him. "We use the goddess of the rainbow, Iris, to send messages to each other when we need to. It's a common way of communication here." She seemed to enjoy his curiosity despite the fact that she was still clearly suspicious of him, and Percy felt a pinch of jealousy in his chest despite himself. He took her hand after that, and although she looked at him in a way that said, _stop being an idiot_, she didn't push him away or deny him.

Carter appeared oblivious throughout, gazing around the camp with awe and worry mixed together, although Sadie had noticed the hand-holding and snuck a smirk at Percy. "How long do you think we'll be here?" he asked.

"No idea," Percy said. "Probably not super long. We'll be able to come up with a way to get you clean." Clean might not have been the right word - he certainly didn't see himself as dirty because he was infused with Greek magic - but it was the best he could come up with.

"Of course we will," Annabeth verfied, sounding as confident as ever. She released Percy's hand to enter his cabin, with him behind her and the Kanes coming in last.

"Nice place," Sadie said, looking over the bunks and the fountain in the center with a keen eye. She turned to Annabeth. "Where's your room?"

"We're divided into cabins by our godly parent," Annabeth told her. "I thought Percy would have told you by now."

"I just showed them where they were," Percy replied, embarassed.

Annabeth just waved him off. "It doesn't matter." She scooped a drachma out of her pocket and handed it to Sadie. As she did so, Percy turned on the fountain and it began producing mist. "Just toss it into the mist," Annabeth educated the Kanes, "and say, 'O goddess, please accept my offering,' and say who you want to contact."

Sadie stepped forward, hesitated, and then repeated the words and addressed the message to Bast. Immediately, Annabeth and Percy stepped out of the way of the message, but not so much that they couldn't see Bast come into view on the IM. She was a dark-haired woman in a leopard outfit, to Percy's amusement. And she was looking anxious.

"Sadie?" she said. "What's happening? Where are you?"

"Uh, we're fine," Carter jumped in. "We just ran into an issue."

"Something weird's going on," Sadie said. "We're okay, though. But we don't know when we'll be back."

Bast looked at them for a moment, and then glanced at what she could see of their surroundings. Thankfully, there was nothing revealing like a trident or Percy's armor. Just the door of his cabin and the sea-colored walls. "Where are you?" the goddess repeated.

"Er, we're not sure," Sadie answered, her accent coming through a bit as she spoke. "But when we find out, we'll tell you. If we can. We were, er, teleported here. Or something, we're not sure." She seemed far less confident facing Bast, her arrogance deflating and making her seem just a bit younger. It was obvious she didn't like lying to the goddess.

"We'll do our best to contact you soon," Carter piped up. "If you can help us, we'll tell you." Annabeth motioned for him to end the call, so he hurriedly continued, "We have to go now. There's a-a thing."

"Bye," Sadie called, right before Annabeth swept a hand through the mist and Bast's image scattered around the cabin and faded into invisibility. Percy shut the fountain off.

Annabeth seemed unhappy. "You aren't very good liars, are you?"

Sadie frowned. "I'm fine," she said. "I just...don't like lying to Bast, that's all." Carter nodded in agreement.

"It's fine," Percy told them. "Um, we should get you guys a place to stay. I would say the Hermes cabin, but it's always a little crowded, so..."

"Why don't you stay here?" Annabeth suggested. "It's fine, right, Percy?"

He blinked at her. "Uh, yeah, I guess. I mean, there's only one bunk you can use, but-"

"It's mine," Sadie said immediately.

"If it's alright with you," Carter said, looking to Percy for approval.

Having never had bunkmates except for his first few days at camp, and the few times Tyson got to visit, Percy wasn't sure how it would go. He didn't exactly dislike the Kanes, but he didn't know them all that well. "Yeah, it's cool," he said after a minute. "But you need a sleeping bag."

"Right," Annabeth affirmed. "I'll go get some things for you two, and then we're going to bed. You missed dinner," she told Percy.

"That's okay with us," Carter agreed. "We're not hungry, and I think we've had enough excitement for the day."

Sadie sighed as if she wanted to argue, but held back and instead fell onto the bottom bunk, her head sinking into the pillow. "Fine," she muttered.

"Okay," Annabeth said firmly, and then left the cabin to hunt for supplies.

Meanwhile, Percy climbed to the top bunk and elected to try to sleep rather than stay up to wait for Annabeth to come back, or talk to the Kanes. Truthfully, he was exhausted. Since dipping in the River Styx, he had become invincible, and even though that was great for fighting, it tired him out quickly. And although he'd only gone through one short battle today, he was ready to sleep.

"Going to bed?" Carter asked from the floor.

"Yeah. I'm beat. Night."

"Goodnight."

Percy stared at the ceiling for a moment, trying in vain to sort the events of the day out in his head, before he finally gave up and closed his eyes.

* * *

**Okay, so please tell me what you think. If I've gotten anyone out of character (I worry constantly about this, so it would be nice to get some feedback) please tell me. If you think some things could have been done better, please tell me. If anything at all sucks, I'm begging you to drop a review. Or if you like it, that would be nice, and I'd like to know as well.**

**I'm trying to write for at least ten minutes everyday, so maybe I'll have Chapter 3 up Tuesday.**

**Also, as a side note, when I'm writing these stories for The Crossover, I always predict how long the story is going to be. For Only the Beginning I guessed ten or more chapters, and I got ten right on the dot. I've predicted that this one is going to be seven to ten chapters, so we'll see how that goes.**

**Oh, and if you have any ideas for the story, leave me stomething in the reviews along with your opinion of the story so far. I won't necessarily use it, but you might have a golden idea that will work perfectly with my plans. You never know.**

**Until next time, then.**


	3. Chapter 3

**Ahh, I always end up at least a week late, sorry guys. Thanks for sticking with me anyway. I know it's not as big a gap as some, but I still feel really guilty, especially since the last parts of the chapter are mostly just fillers, although there are a few things to note as you read. Like the last chapter, not exactly super exciting. But we're getting there, I hope.**

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That night, he had a very strange dream.

It felt a lot like one of those infamous demigod dreams that everyone at Camp Half-Blood fell victim to at one point, Percy more than most. A kind of prophetic dream, telling of what was soon to happen or happening currently, while the demigod was asleep, it made sleeping a chore and a danger, even though the demigod still got their rest. However, this one seemed a lot more like a normal dream - confusing and disorienting, not making much sense at all in Percy's head.

He was seeing ghosts.

It wasn't a super weird thing - Percy's half-cousin Nico, son of Hades, had the ability to summon the dead as he pleased, and Percy'd been to the Underworld before, so he had seen his fair share of spirits. But these were different, somehow.

He was standing on a large space of grass, with debris buried in the ground here and there. And there were ghosts all around him, seeming to stare at him. There was a thick, heavy fog surrounding Percy and the ghostly figures, so he couldn't really see their faces or identify them. He was forced to look at the stomachs down and try to tell who they were.

Unsurprisingly, he didn't recognize any of them. There were skirts, shorts, pants, and a variety of shoes, but nothing really familiar. It was all pretty modern, though, he noticed. And pretty nice. In the middle of his inspection, one of the ghosts nearest him stepped forward him, sending him stumbling backwards in surprise.

"Whoa, whoa," he said, and his voice sounded warped and creepy. The dreamscape was eerily silent, like if it were a horror movie there would be suspenseful music playing right now, and Percy was not happy about it. He held up his hands to show the ghost he didn't mean any harm, and it didn't move forward again. He took a close look at it - it wore a long coat, with polished shoes and pants that looked like they belonged to a suit. A man, Percy determined.

The ghost moved again, jolting Percy up to its hand, which was extended as if offering a shake. The fog had cleared enough for him to make out a pair of blank ghostly eyes and a head of messy curly hair.

"Um, hi," the demigod facing it said, trying not to stammer. Ghosts didn't normally bother him a whole lot, but they were nothing if not creepy, and he'd never seen them as interactive as this. He'd thought they couldn't touch people, but this one was trying to shake his hand. At least it wasn't talking.

The ghost stood still, unmoving, and Percy's heart was pounding wildly. Everything in him was telling him to run, but he stayed in place. Mostly because the other ghosts were ringing around him now and blocking his exit.

He met the ghost's eyes for a moment, indecisive and just a little bit terrified. And then he took its hand.

IIIIII

Sadie was very tempted, when she knew Percy had fallen asleep, to quickly get herself together, grab Carter, and make a break for it. She didn't want to be here. She didn't think she could stand it for very long.

"We should go," she said, quietly, to her brother.

"Annabeth's coming back," he reminded her, but he in no way sounded opposed to her idea.

Sadie didn't bother to stifle the swell of irritation she felt. "So? I mean, I wasn't saying we should go _right now_, but after she leaves, we could wait a while and then get out." She was tired, and even though it was uncomfortable, the pillow used to keep her _ba_, her soul, from wandering and getting lost while she was asleep (it was a pesky magician thing that she didn't like all that much) seemed very appealing just now.

Carter sighed. "Believe me, I want to go, too," he said, "but maybe we should earn their trust first? Besides, this could be the end of the world, and we might have to be here. Maybe this is where we're supposed to be."

"Don't be stupid, we could help just as good back home. Keep in touch and whatever we need to do."

"They'll just haul us back."

Sadie gave a huff. "Fine. But they don't know where we live, at least, so maybe they wouldn't be able to catch us."

Carter looked at her, and she looked back at him. They were both clearly exhausted and worried (pending apocalypses tend to do that to a person), and wanted to get out now. Every line on her brother's face said, _I want to go._ There'd been a time, she remembered, where she wouldn't have been able to read his expression if it would save her life. But now that they were living together, and growing closer, he felt more like her brother than he ever had when she'd lived in England.

"What if we end the world by leaving?" he whispered. "What if Bast finds out and tells the House of Life anyway, and the Egyption gods wake up again, and we have to deal with another apocalypse besides the one that we already know is coming up?"

"I don't think she would."

_Please make a good enough point so I can be happy with leaving, _his face said. She wished he would just agree with him already, and forget about this whole thing for a while. Sure, the fact that they could be condemning the world was bugging Sadie, too, and she wanted to fix it, but she felt stifled here, cut off from everything familiar.

"Let's just go," she urged him, trying to put a bit of kindness into her voice. "I get it, okay, I don't want to destroy the world on accident, either. But we can't be here."

Carter stared at her for a minute, and then sighed and nodded, rubbing his face. "I guess," he agreed, at last, just as Annabeth came into the cabin, bearing a thick sleeping bag and a sky blue pillow.

"Here," she said, and dumped them into Carter's lap. She then surveyed the siblings with a keen, suspicious eye. "Something wrong?" she asked, coolly.

"No," Sadie answered, just as icily. She didn't like Annabeth a whole lot. She seemed like a supreme know-it-all. "Carter was feeling bad about lying to Bast, but I reminded him about the possible end of the world and all that, and he agreed with me. Everything's fine."

Carter shot her a glare as he set up his makeshift bed.

Annabeth didn't seem to buy the story, judging by the frown on her face, but she said, "If you're sure," and forced herself to move on. "If you need anything else," she said, "let me know." And with one last look at all of them, the sleeping Percy included, she stepped outside, turning off the light and closing the door a little bit harder than necessary behind her.

"I don't like her," Sadie grumbled. She settled back down onto her pillow, eyes trained on the bunk above her, where Percy was stirring a little in his sleep and muttering something about coats.

"I don't either," Carter agreed, nothing but a voice in the darkness now.

Sadie felt her eyes closing, and forced them back open. There was no way she could fall asleep, not when she had to escape tonight.

"What if we take shifts?" she suggested. "I sleep first, and then you wake me up in a couple hours, and then you sleep. And then we leave at, like, midnight."

"Sure," her brother muttered.

"Carter!" she snapped, as loudly as she dared to with a sleeping demigod above her. "I'm serious. Don't fall asleep."

"I won't."

"Good."

And then there was a potent silence, where Sadie thought she could actually hear her brother drifting off. She considered waking him up just to be annoying - it was supposed to be her sleeping right now - but decided not to. She'd get revenge on him later.

She repositioned herself again, shifting on the mattress and blinking as her eyes adjusted to the darkness.

_Two hours, then I'll wake Carter up and get some sleep, _she thought, and turned her mind to escape ideas, in case anything went wrong. She wanted to be prepared, after all.

IIIIII

Percy woke up with watery morning light streaming into the cabin. He blinked and rubbed his eyes to clear his head of his strange dream and looked to the door, which was the source of the light. Annabeth stood there, her hair in its usual ponytail and wearing her orange camp shirt. He sat up. "Get up, Seaweed Brain," she ordered, "or you'll miss breakfast." She cast a long look at the Kanes, who were also waking up. "They'll want something to eat, too," she said, and then left.

"She's just a ball of sunshine, isn't she?" Sadie grumbled as Percy climbed out of his bunk. She looked strained and more annoyed than usual, but the sleep had clearly done her good. Her brother was stressed out too, it was obvious, but Percy decided to ignore it for now.

"Nobody really knows what to think of you yet," he told the youngest Kane, uncomfortable. "Um, we can go anytime you're ready. I can get you guys clothes and stuff after breakfast."

"Good," Sadie said. "I'm starving. And dirty." She held her head high, although she looked unhappy, and stomped past Percy and outdoors. Carter followed her, an apology written on his face as he passed.

They went to breakfast, where the Kanes marveled over the food and Carter especially questioned Percy about their offerings to the Greek gods. Percy liked answering questions about things he understood, and warmed up to Carter a little more through their conversation.

After they'd finished eating, Annabeth slipped over to them and together she and Percy got some clothes for the magicians - a few t-shirts each, and two pairs of jeans. "We can wash the stuff you're wearing now, too," Percy told them, and they seemed happy about that.

Once they'd all taken turns dressing and getting themselves ready (the Kanes had also been gifted with tooth and hair brushes, and nice warm showers), the demigods and their magician companions headed to the Big House, where once again Rachel was sitting outside and reading, although Chiron and Mr. D were nowhere in sight.

"Hi Percy, Annabeth," the redhead greeted, closing her book and smiling at them. Percy noticed that she looked more tired and worried than usual, and felt a pang of worry himself, the first since yesterday.

He forced a smile anyway. "Hey, what's up?"

"Nothing." She turned her attention to Carter and Sadie, who were standing behind the demigods and whispering to each other, nearly silent. "How was your first night at camp?" she asked, loudly enough to draw their attention.

Carter had the decency to look embarrassed. Sadie didn't seem to care much. "Alright," the oldest replied. His sister nodded in agreement.

"Chiron and I talked," Rachel said, "and we thought that we could introduce you two to the camp tonight. We're playing capture-the-flag, too, so you can join in on that."

"Have you come up with any way to get us out of here?" Sadie asked. "We'd kind of like to go home. Now."

Rachel shrugged helplessly. "I don't know," she replied, her expression distressed. "I mean, we'd all be happy if you guys could leave, too, without the world ending or something. But we can't be sure."

Sadie's upper lip was curled in distaste, and she looked intensely unhappy, the relief of clean clothes and a shower forgotten.

"It's fine," Carter jumped in, but he didn't look satisfied either. "Just do your best. We can't lie to Bast for too much longer, or she'll get too suspicious and try to find us."

"Of course," Annabeth said. "We're doing all we can." She took Percy's hand then, and the son of Poseidon understood with a sinking feeling that his girlfriend's confidence was fading, and she was worried. And she looked, Percy thought, like she hadn't gotten a whole lot of sleep last night. Everyone was tired, it seemed, and no one was happy at all. Any good spirits from earlier had disappeared like they'd never been there, and they were all as well off as they'd been yesterday; tired, anxious, and impatient.

"Also," Annabeth added, "I'd like to talk to Chiron."

Rachel gestured to the door. "He's inside."

Annabeth nodded, gave Percy's hand an almost undetectable squeeze, and then went into the Big House.

"So, what about capture-the-flag?" Sadie asked, arms crossed in her usual irritated way. She was also smacking on another piece of gum. Percy wondered if she had a hidden stash or something. "I'm in the mood for running around and beating some people up."

She didn't look strong enough to really do that last part, at least not without magical assistance, but Percy knew that a good sword (or in Sadie and Carter's case, maybe a staff) and some basic skills could have a big impact on intimidation and power. And he was feeling wired, too, and he needed to burn off some of his restless energy. And soon.

"Okay," he said. "Let's go get you guys some weapons, and practice."

"Can I use my staff?" Sadie requested, raising a hand like she was in class.

"Sword training is important," Percy told her, almost like he was lecturing. He didn't like the feeling. "Besides, you'll have an unfair advantage when we play. You can have a magic item though, if you have one."

Sadie's face suddenly broke into a wide grin. "Fine," she agreed. "Swords and magic items it is."

* * *

**How did you all like that? Leave me a review, those are always nice, and criticism, as I always mention, is appreciated if you have any.**

**Next chapter includes introducing the Kanes to the demigods of Camp Half-Blood, a bit of capture the flag and SURPRISE! some actual action, I hope. Isn't that nifty? (Haha, nifty XD)**

**I'd better get writing. I'm looking at Saturday for Chapter 4, but be prepared for around next Wednesday if I get behind myself again.**

**Oh, also, if anyone is interested in answering a random question of mine - who is your favorite Kane Chronicles and/or Percy Jackson character? And what would you like to see happen to this/these character(s) in the future? Keep in mind that this is no garuntee that I'll use your idea, but it's nice to hear from you all, and you might have a really good or entertaining idea, so.**

**See you all Saturday, if all goes according to plan.**


	4. Chapter 4

**Hey all. It's been too long since I've updated, so sorry. I'm afraid this chapter isn't my favorite, because it's shorter than I'm entirely happy with, and I feel like the action scenes are lacking, like I feel they always do in my writing. Maybe that's just me.**

**Anyway, this update has been delayed thanks to the school musical, which is going well and consuming my afternoons. Also, NaNoWriMo starts next week, so I've been prepping for that. Updates will be done on the weekends, most likely, when I have the most time, but don't expect an update every week. I need to write about 1,700 words a day to reach the 50,000 word goal, so there's not a whole lot of time for this, sorry. However, it will be updated, even if only once during November.**

* * *

They trained for a few hours, and even though Sadie was confident, Carter was better than her, and she was too clumsy with a sword to stand much of a chance against Percy. All the same, she did pretty well for a beginner, and she managed to retain her pride throughout the training by taunting Percy enough to satisfy herself.

By the time lunch rolled around, Annabeth had joined them, and she and Percy had demonstrated a sword and knife fight for the Kanes. Then they went to eat, and came back to Percy's cabin when they were finished for some rest.

Annabeth brought some of her Mount Olympus blueprints along and worked diligently on them on Percy's bunk while Percy sat beside her and stared at some Ancient Greek text and pretended to be practicing. Below, the Kanes went over new spells and talked quietly enough about other things that Percy couldn't quite hear them most of the time.

Then there was dinner, and the campfire, where Carter and Sadie were introduced to the camp, amidst murmurs and exclamations of shock and confusion. And then, finally, capture the flag.

Sadie was hefting a sword she'd been working with earlier, and clanking around in Greek armor. Her brother was doing the same, a calculating look on his face as he gazed at the opposing team, sizing them up.

Percy was on the same team as the Kanes, as was Annabeth, so together they tromped with the rest of their team to where they had decided to set up the flag.

"There," Travis Stoll said as he shoved the post of their rippling blue flag into the dirt. He then began setting up small traps around the flag to catch the other team off guard when they went to steal it. "I'm going to get Connor good," he promised the team, grinning. His brother was on the opposite team, and despite the old cliche that twins liked to stay close to each other and were inseperable, the Stoll brothers delighted in being apart so that they could prank each other. It distracted them from pranking other people at least, which was something. Percy figured Travis would have something good prepared, and so didn't ask when he started slathering peanut butter on the ground by the flag.

"Travis, you stay here and watch the flag and your traps," Annabeth decided. As one of Athena's most capable children, she was automatically and without question elected as the leader, with Percy alongside her. "I'm going to go into enemy territory and try to get their flag. Percy, you wait by the river."

He saw the sense in it - he was the son of Poseidon, after all - but he liked to be in charge of his own position usually, and he didn't want to play defense very often. This was no exeption. However, he could see the look in her eye - _I'm not done yet, Seaweed Brain, shut up for a minute._

"And soak anyone that walks by?" Sadie snarked. "Very useful." Her brother cut her off with a nudge to her side. She scowled and shifted awkwardly in her armor. Percy was mildly sympathetic; his first time with Greek armor had been nearly as uncomfortable.

"Sadie and Carter," Annabeth continued with an icy glare in the direction of the youngest Kane, "you can stay with him."

Percy understood instantly, and felt a little uncomfortable. Judging by the looks of the Kanes, they did, too, and they weren't terribly happy.

Sadie huffed. "That's not fair. We can go with you and get the flag, we're not afraid. I'm not, at least."

"Neither am I," Carter put in, clearly unable to resist.

"And we don't need to be babysat. You can trust us. And we can handle a few demigods, easy. We don't need a boring job."

"You'll have plenty to do," Percy's girlfriend informed them. "You'll have to look carefully for the enemy and stop them from getting our flag. You'll be very busy."

Sadie looked doubtful, but didn't comment, surprisingly.

Annabeth, encouraged, continued, "Erica, Tom, you can come with me, upwards past the river a bit and watch my back..." She went on, assigning everyone their positions with occasional input from Percy before it was time to begin. Travis and the other guard that had been appointed, a pimply pre-teen son of Demeter named Canton, took their places on opposite sides of the flag exactly ten feet away from it, as the rules indicated. Everyone else readied themselves to rush off, and Percy kept an eye on the Kanes as the horn blasted through the forest and they raced off to their positions.

When they reached the creek, a few demigods were already leaping over and being very obvious about it. Percy spotted the glint of armor in the corner of his eye, and knew that the kids in front of him were a distraction. "Take them," he told the Kanes, pointing his sword at the demigods, and then he ran at top speed toward where he'd seen the armor.

Quickly, he came onto a girl squatting in the bushes and attempting to communicate with a partner of hers several trees away, mouthing something about one of their teammates that was coming up behind them or something along those lines - it was hard to tell. Percy dragged her away from her bush, getting a cry of terror out of her in response, and knocked her on the back of the head as gently as he could to momentarily incapitate her.

"Sorry," he said as she groaned and shifted groggily on the forest floor. Percy took out her friend, too. They would both be out of commission for a good half an hour to an hour. That was plenty long enough to snatch the red flag. Satisfied, he started back to the creek and eliminated any demigods he came across (there were three). Unfortunately, he didn't think any of them had been the friend the girls had been talking about.

He knew he was right when someone took him from behind, grabbing him at the neck and shoving him at the ground full-force.

"Hey, Jackson," Clarisse greeted with a devilish grin. The light of battle was in her eyes as she pointed her sword at him. Usually she had an electric spear of some sort, but she'd apparently opted for a blade this time around.

"Where's Lamer?" he asked, genuinely surprised and doing his best to ignore the blade pointed at his throat. He was invincible, sure, but swords near his head made him nervous anyway.

Clarisse snarled at him, stomping angrily on his chest. He didn't have any armor, so if he had been normal, it would have hurt a good deal. "It's Maimer," she growled, and made the move to slash at him. However, he rolled away at the last minute, almost sending her sprawling as her foot was twisted off of him.

"Really, though, where is it? Broken again?" Percy couldn't help but grin. "That sucks, man."

"If I hit you hard enough, you're still out, Jackson," the daughter of Ares ground out. "Don't forget it."

"I wasn't planning on it." Because of his dip in the Styx, Percy should have been banned from capture the flag, but Chiron thought it would be good practice, and Percy'd been instructed to be logical about would-be injuries and such. So if Clarisse got him like he'd gotten the two girls, he'd have to at the very least back off for a bit. Long enough for a normal person to recover. He didn't like it, but he knew it was only fair to the other team.

Clarisse lunged at him again, and this time he was a little too slow and was smacked in the side of the head with the flat of her blade. And even though he was basically invincible, it didn't stop his brain from rattling around a little bit, and he stumbled.

When he'd recovered, Clarisse was inching in the direction of the blue flag, indecision written clearly on her face. Her dad was the god of war - her first instinct would be to incapitate him. But strategy, which was also a part of war, said to leave him.

Percy started toward her, expecting her to fight him, but then she just looked smug, like she'd already won, and darted off, out of sight.

"What's taking you so long?" someone demanded right behind him. He whirled around, Riptide at the ready, but was met with nobody but an unamused Sadie Kane. "You've been gone forever. Nobody's been soaked yet, you know," she mocked. "You haven't been doing your job."

"I've been busy," Percy told her shortly, frowning. She just smirked at him.

"Carter's still at the river," she said. "We've gotten a whole bunch of them. They're good, but we're better." She grinned and sauntered back to the creek.

"Been using magic?" Percy asked in a somewhat low tone as he followed her, in a bad attempt to be discreet and stealthy. Oh well, it wasn't like the other team didn't know they were there.

"All magic items are allowed," Sadie said haughtily, with a knowing smile as she reached in front of her and brought her hand back gripping her staff. "I guess that's our advantage."

Percy tried not to gape at her too much. "How do you do the-" he mimed pulling the staff out of thin air.

"There's a thing called the Duat," she said. "It's sort of hard to explain, but sometimes we use it as a locker thing. Carter more than me, but still." As she was saying this, they came upon none other than her brother bending over a fallen camper, checking the teenager for signs of fight. When the boy on the ground made no reaction, Carter straightened and looked to his sister and Percy, nodding at them.

"Good job," Percy said, a light smile flitting across his face despite the slight pang of jealousy in him. He would have to keep that under control. It wasn't like Carter had even done anything that impressive. And Percy knew that the guy probably wouldn't make a move on Annabeth. So far, he hadn't seemed interested in her. Percy was worrying over nothing.

The three of them stood watch by the river, swords held aloft. Three more demigods attempted to get by them, and failed, all three retreating into the forest before they could be taken down. Things were going well so far, despite the fact that Annabeth and the two that had been with her hadn't come back yet, and no flags had been spotted.

That was, until the girl named Erica came up beside them, gasping for breath, and said, "Annabeth's coming with the flag," in an undertone, with no small amount of excitement. "She told me to come and join you guys. She'll be here soon, with Tom covering her back."

"Sweet," Sadie grinned. She held her sword a little higher, a little easier, ready for a fight. "If anyone on the other team tries to get by us before that, we'll be-"

Carter gave a wordless shout, just as a boy Percy didn't recognize, with Clarisse behind him fending off a wave of angry demigods from the blue team. Her lips were twisted into a snarl, and her eyes were alight with battle. Percy, however, was paying more attention to the boy with the blue flag slightly crumpled in his fist, coming at full speed toward the creek. If he got by, the red team would win.

Sadie got there before him, her staff pointed at the boy as she began spouting some Egyption phrase, but was interrupted by a swell of the shadows around them and the arrival of a black-clad boy rushing out of the darkness and colliding with the red team member with an audible noise, and several screams of surprise from onlooking campers.

The chaos didn't die down then, though, because Clarisse clunked the nearest opponent on the helmet with her sword, and bolted for the blue flag, snatching it out of the kid's grasp and racing to the creek.

At the same time, Annabeth was coming from the opposite side with a stream of the red team and Tom behind her, the clatter of swords and shouts and cries becoming louder as they closed in. And to make things more intense, Annabeth had the red flag clutched tightly in her left hand, while her right one gripped her dagger. She spotted Clarisse, eyes narrowing, and screamed something like, "For the gods' sake, Percy, stop her!"

Sadie and Carter had also turned their attentions to Clarisse, and were readying themselves beside Percy as she came at them. Percy, despite the approaching demigod, couldn't keep his eyes off the boy currently climbing to his feet not far behind Clarisse.

Then she was upon them, fighting skillfully, as all children of Ares did, as she tried to squeeze past their defense, and he had to tear himself away. And Annabeth was roaring closer to the creek as well, her feet pounding loudly on the forest floor like a ticking clock.

Clarisse kneed Carter in the place where it hurt, resulting in a squeak and a clang as his sword hit the ground. Annabeth dodged trees, prepearing to leap over the creek, pure concentration in her stormy eyes. Clarisse tore Sadie's staff out of her hands and tossed it in the water, and removed her sword as well, all the time wearing a smirk. Annabeth drew closer. Clarisse raised her sword, and it would've clashed with Percy's, except that he saw a flicker of something terrible behind her. Something ghostly and unearthly. Clarisse pushed him aside. Annabeth lunged.

The girls, miraculously and torturously, hit the ground at the same time. Percy felt hollowed with disbelief and a little bit of fear. He glanced back to where the thing had been. There was nothing there.

Someone called out, "IT'S A TIE!" in the distance. There were howls of defeat and angry conversations. Annabeth got to her feet and shrugged off Percy when he tried to take the flag from her. Clarisse snarled and snorted on the other side of the creek, throwing her sword into the grass and growling to herself. Sadie, with a murderous look on her face, picked her staff out of the water - she didn't bother touching the sword. Carter leaned heavily against a tree, looking pained. Percy, feeling heavy and tired now, turned to the boy in all black who was rubbing his head a little and standing by himself. Nobody else would go near him. Instead, they murmured to each other and stared in shock.

"Percy," Nico said, lowering his hand and turning serious. He looked more like a ghost than usual, his eyes dark and grim. "I need to talk to Chiron."

* * *

**Welp, there we go. Whoever the reviewer was that like Nico, here you go! You gave me an idea with your comment, and so here we are. Nico is now a part of this story. He was going to come in eventually in the original thing, but now he's here sooner. Brilliant, as the Tenth Doctor would say.**

**Well, review and tell me what you thought, please. And if you disliked this chapter, tell me how I could improve it. I might just take your advice. Or if you liked it, tell me what you thought was good. That's all for now. Thank you everyone. :)**

**EDIT: I've gotten around to changing the part where Clarisse defeats Percy, because of course that woudn't happen unless something distracted him. Thank you to whoever pointed that out, this chapter was a little sloppy anyway.**


	5. Chapter 5

**Well, hello everyone. I'm back, and I'm happy to report that this story is finished in seven chapters, and I'm on the first chapter of the next in this series. Things are looking good! :D**

**Also, I've edited some of chapter 4. Now there's a reason Percy couldn't fight Clarisse off, and it makes sense! Yay for sense!**

**So anyway, I hope you enjoy. :)**

* * *

Nico's face was dark as he trudged just ahead of Percy and Annabeth, with the Kanes shortly behind, in the direction of the Big House. Chiron stood outside, obviously in centaur form already. He stared at Nico as he approached.

"Chiron," the son of Hades said gravely, "I need to talk to you. It's important."

"Who are you, anyway?" Sadie blurted. Percy was surprised that she'd managed to stay quiet for so long. "How did you just-"

Nico gave her an icy glare, one that didn't belong on a kid his age.

"He lives here," Percy interjected. "Sometimes."

"Somet-" Carter must have elbowed her, because she abruptly fell quiet and muttered something that sounded like a curse (although it wasn't in English). And then murmured something that sounded like, "looks like Anubis," but Percy couldn't be sure.

Chiron looked them all over. "Capture the flag resulted in a tie, correct?"

Annabeth nodded, her eyes stormy and her lips turned downward into a scowl. She gave Percy a glare, and he felt a little guilty. It'd been his job to stop Clarisse, he knew that. But he couldn't really be blamed, could he, with what he'd seen? However, her bad mood was mostly abandoned as Chiron invited them all inside. Percy almost thought he would turn Carter and Sadie away when he hesitated, but he didn't speak up and allowed them in without a word. They seated themselves around the ping-pong table, as per usual, and Nico began speaking as soon as everyone was settled.

"I had a strange dream recently," he reported. "It wasn't like anything I'd ever seen before. Definitely a demigod dream, but it was different also. I was in a field..."

He went on to describe, to Percy's horror, nearly the exact same dream that he himself had had the night before. The interactions, according to Nico, had been a bit different, though. Such as, he hadn't been approached by the long-coated, curly-haired man, but instead by a boy close to Percy's age wearing a weird cloak that looked not unlike camoflage, but Nico was sure that it wasn't. The boy had apparently reached a hand out, but Nico, who had better relationships with ghosts than he did with humans, had accepted it after a few moments, unlike Percy. Then, after a dizzying moment, he'd woken up and known instantly that he had to bring the story to camp.

At the end of his story, everyone in the room was quiet and uncertain, and Percy was more jittery than usual. Chiron's face held faint traces of worry, while Annabeth's was stony and unreadable. Sadie and Carter were exchanging concerned looks as well.

"Chiron," Annabeth finally said, and Percy was relieved to hear that her voice was steady. He could feel a little better knowing that his girlfriend wasn't yet worried enough to show it. "I had a dream similar to that last night."

Sadie cleared her throat and admitted, "Me too." Her usual fire was gone.

Percy's heart felt like it had frozen. Carter said, "So did I."

"Um," Percy began. "Yeah."

Chiron looked them all over again, like he had outside, but this time with a look more serious than before. "I'm going to call Rachel in," he informed them all. "This is all very concerning." He stepped out, called for Rachel, and then came back in with her behind him. She squeezed into the room and plopped down beside Percy. Her red hair was drawn up into a ponytail, and her face was lined with stress. And when Chiron had Nico recount his story, she looked downright worried. Even more so when the others confessed to similar dreams.

"Well," she said after a deep breath, "I was really hoping that maybe this wouldn't be anything big. Because I just had a dream a couple of days ago like the ones you all were talking about. It was different than a normal dream, and it felt...bad. I hoped it was just an Oracle thing, maybe just a message from the Oracle inside me or something - I don't know - because all the people I saw in my dream were women and girls. So I thought..." she bit her lip and broke off, frowning intently at the table.

"We need to figure this out," Nico insisted. "These weren't normal ghosts, either, so that's bad. We've all had this dream - even them." He gestured to the Kanes. Somewhere in between all the dream-telling, their presence had been explained. And Nico was understandably uncertain about them.

"Do you think this is still something prophetic, though?" Carter asked. He obviously knew enough about Greek mythology to know about the Oracle, and he had evidently figured out Rachels purpose at camp. Sadie also appeared to know, had probably had it explained to her by Carter at some point. Percy didn't know. His head was spinning.

"It has to be because we're here, right?" Sadie butted in. "I mean, Rachel there had this dream before we came, but she's a prophet or something, so that's explainable. But the rest of us only had it last night, when me and Carter were here for the first time."

Annabeth nodded, looking to her with respect for probably the first time. "That's what I was thinking."

"So, what, is it a message from the gods?" Percy asked. "I mean, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense, but are they ever simple or easy to understand? Or, um, spot?"

"They weren't gods," Nico said firmly. "I could tell that. They were mortal. And they weren't dead, at all. They were ghosts, but they weren't dead."

Sadie grumbled, "How does that work?"

"Maybe they're not actually ghosts?" Percy offered.

"No, they're obviously not," Carter agreed. Percy felt a sense of companionship to the younger boy for the first time since his arrival. Especially when they exchanged a look of unease, one that wasn't laced with suspicion or distrust as well. Percy didn't entirely trust in the Kanes, of course not, but if nothing else would bring people together, pending doom would. And he could feel it now, pressing on him with overwhelming force.

"So not ghosts, but extremely ghost-like," Annabeth summed up. The others nodded affirmative. "Has anyone ever heard of anything like that?"

Rachel sighed and rubbed her eyes. "No. They're mortal, I mean, how...?" There were murmurs of agreement.

"Perhaps we should meet again tomorrow," Chiron suggested wearily. "We can see if there are any developments in the morning."

"Should we tell the camp?" Percy asked.

Nico shook his head. "I don't think so. Not until we're sure there's a danger. I mean, we can't be sure yet. It's not nothing, but we don't know if we need to tell everyone yet or not."

"I think we should tell Grover and the satyrs, though," Annabeth offered. "They might have news as well." And, Percy thought, it would be nice to talk to Grover again. They hadn't spoken in a little while, what with Grover's new position. He thought he'd like to say hi, at least.

Chiron nodded. "That sounds wise. As for you, Nico, will you be staying the night?"

The son of Hades picked at a stray piece of fabric on his sweatshirt sleeve. "I guess I should," he muttered. "I don't want to miss the meeting tomorrow."

"Okay then," Annabeth said. "That's settled."

Sadie, who had been suspiciously quiet throughout this last exchange, finally spoke up. "I think Carter and I should call Bast again," she said, firmly and without question. "I know it's only been a day, and you guys _obviously_ don't trust us yet, but you can supervise our conversation or something, like last time. Bast will know if this all has something to do with the gods or not, I mean. It'll be useful. And she definitely won't tell the House of Life. We're all enemies, seriously. I swear I'm telling the truth."

Percy had to admit that she looked truthful then, her eyes dark with the potential danger, and her eyes slightly wider, with determination swimming in them. But his gut insisted that he shouldn't trust them - something was going to go horribly, horribly wrong. Annabeth looked equally uneasy, as did Rachel and Nico.

"That might not be the best thing right now," Chiron said carefully. "Perhaps if we're struggling to find answers after the meeting tomorrow, you can. But there's still a chance we can find out what we need to know without risk to our camp, and until we have no other choice, I do not want to invest in your friend. I'm sure she's honorable, but gods have always been flighty-" he said this in a lower voice "-and I don't think she is the exception."

Sadie looked downright furious. "Bast has looked after us both for a long time," she spat, and it sounded like the beginning of a long and fiery rant. Fortunately, Carter interrupted her.

"We honestly don't think Bast would betray us," he said earnestly. "Please, you have to believe us."

"Tomorrow," Annabeth replied, repeating Chiron's verdict. "If we don't have anything by tomorrow, then you can. I promise."

Clearly Sadie had a bad taste in her mouth, judging by the sour look on her face. Carter wasn't quiet as angry as she was, but he was nearly. His eyes were alight with warning to them all. Despite all their bickering, Percy understood that he would defend his sister against them if he had to.

"Let's all just calm down," Rachel said. "This isn't life or death, not yet. We still have a chance. Maybe this is far away." She was a lot calmer now than before, at least in voice and on her face. "We might not have to worry about for a bit. Let's just think about this tonight, and see what we can find out. Okay?"

Everyone took a few breaths to calm themselves, but the Kanes weren't calm by any extent despite it. And so Percy couldn't entirely relax - not that he'd expected to.

"I think we should go to bed ASAP," Nico told them all. "Percy and Annabeth, you guys can go talk to Grover. I can stay with those two," he motioned to the Kanes, "until you get back."

"We don't need a babysitter," Sadie snarled. Carter didn't even bother to stop her.

Nobody paid much attention to her. "Dismissed," Chiron decided, looking unsettled. "Until tomorrow." Percy's stomach churned as he stood, and he took Annabeth's hand as they walked out of the building.

"Go see Grover," Nico called over his shoulder at them as he wandered behind the Kanes on the way to his cabin. There was hardly anyone outside anymore. Everyone appeared to have retired to their cabins for the night, giving a bigger sense of unease to the situation.

Percy nodded to him, looked to Annabeth, and together they started to the woods.

* * *

Sadie's heart pounded, and her blood boiled with anger as she, Carter, and the deathly pale kid named Nico headed off toward Nico's cabin. After Percy and Annabeth had departed, the boy had gotten in front of Sadie and Carter and started leading them off to where he lived "sometimes." She was so angry she thought she might be seeing things, flickers at the edge of her vision. When she looked, there was nothing there, and she knew that it was all in her head. She felt mildly insane despite the fact that it was obviously because she was furious.

Carter, normally almost unflappable, had narrowed eyes and clenched fists, and Sadie knew he had been as hurt by the others' distrust as she was. And she knew that he wanted to speak to Bast as badly as she did. She knew that Bast could help them. She was certain of it. Her friend wouldn't come after them, would she, if they told her they were alright? Maybe they wouldn't even have to tell her where they were. Maybe she wouldn't be able to tell.

Without a word spoken, she nudged Carter and caught his eye, and then glanced to Nico, who appeared blissfully unaware of them. Carter frowned at her, but she could see that he was tempted, and she encouraged him by crossed her arms and nodding to Nico again.

Her brother's eyes seemed to ask, _What do you want me to do with him?_

She mimed bashing him in the back of the head, and Carter winced a little and shook his head. _After he's asleep,_ he mouthed. _We'll call Bast._

Sadie huffed, but didn't argue. Instead, she spoke to Nico. "Our stuff's in Percy's cabin," she told him, as obnoxiously as she could. He deserved it, after all. "Are you going to have us stay with you tonight, or what? 'Cause if you are, we're going to need to get our stuff."

He glared back at them. "No, you'll just be with me until Percy and Annabeth get back. You don't even have to go inside, if you don't want. Or we could hang out at Percy's place. He won't care. Probably."

Sadie smirked. "Okay. Let's go to Percy's." She didn't want to be somewhere unfamiliar when it was totally dark and she would have to navigate her way to Percy's fountain. So when they reached Percy's cabin, they filed inside.

Nothing much happened after that. Nico sat on Percy's bunk and listened to his iPod, looking particularly gothic and rather like Anubis while he was at it. Sadie couldn't shake their resemblance, and she felt somewhat stupid for it. She and Carter occupied themselves practicing spells and talking quietly about the _other_ pending disaster they had to deal with. Sadie felt like ripping her hair out with impatience.

An hour had passed, at least, when Percy finally came into the cabin and blinked at the three of them. He obviously had expected them elsewhere. "Um," he said.

"Hey Percy," Nico greeted, climbing down. "You done?"

"Uh, yeah."

"Good. Bye." And then the boy left in a smear of black, closing the door sharply behind him.

"Well, he's a joy," Sadie snarked. Percy's eyes narrowed slightly, and she knew she'd hit a nerve. She held back a grin.

"Why don't we go to bed," Carter suggested, eyeing Sadie with a cautionary look in his eyes. "If we're going to find out anything, we should go to sleep and see what comes up."

Percy stared at both of them for a moment, suspicion clear in his eyes. And although Sadie didn't like being distrusted, she pushed it away and tried not to show too much of her impatience. After a long moment, Percy requested that they turn away to let him change, and so they did. Then they took turns changing clothes and got ready for bed. At last, Percy turned out the lights and clambered into bed, and Sadie and Carter got into their respective beds to wait for Percy to fall asleep.

"'Night," the demigod said.

"'Night," Sadie replied, and Carter echoed her. It was a short time after that they they heard a soft snore from the bunk, and Sadie shot to her feet. She picked her way as quietly as possible over to Percy's things and dug through them until she found a single shining coin like the one she'd used before. Carter joined her in front of the fountain. He turned it on, and mist spread in front of them, cold and chilling in the night.

"Okay, so...O goddess, please accept our offering," Sadie whispered, glancing a bit nervously to Percy as she spoke. She flicked the golden coin into the mist, and it disappeared. "Connect us to Bast," she murmured, and quickly her goddess friend swam into view, her eyes wide as she stared at them.

She was quiet for a moment before she growled, "Where. Are. You."

"Shh," Sadie ordered. "We need to be quiet."

"Why, what's going on?"

"Someone's sleeping here, and we can't wake him up." Her heart was pounding. "We need your help."

The cat goddess looked simultaniously relieved and concerned. "Okay. Where are you at so I can-"

"No," Sadie interrupted, "we just need to talk to you."

"Have you heard anything from the other gods?" Carter broke in. "It's important."

Bast frowned at them. "Not really. A little stirring, but it's happened before, to no avail, so I haven't been...why? What's going on, you two?"

"We've been having dreams," Carter explained after a tense pause. "Us and...um, the people we're with right now. We think it has something to do with us meeting, which apparently we were never supposed to do. The dreams involve ghosts that are apparently mortal, not actually dead, and not really ghosts. We thought it had something to do with the gods, but if they haven't really been doing anything-"

Suddenly, Bast's eyes widened, and she let out a low growl. "Greeks," she snarled. Sadie's heart leapt into her throat. "I can sense them. Where are they keeping you?"

"No, we're fine," Sadie told her, glancing to Percy again. "Really, we're okay. They've been good to us and all that. It's-"

"Sadie-"

"No," Sadie said again. Her heart hammered relentlessly, and she could hardly breathe. Bast couldn't come here. Who knows what the demigods would do to her and Carter if she did. "It's just that something's going on, with all of us, and we're trying to figure out what it is. You don't need to save us."

Bast stared her down. "No," she insisted, still nearly growling. "I'm coming to get you. If these Greeks are really good, they will let me take you back. You don't need to be associating with their kind, Sadie."

"Bast," Carter started, but she cut him off.

"Carter, don't bother. I am coming for you. I'm in charge of you, and I'm going to make sure you're alright. There is nothing you can do to stop me. It's for your own good." She swung a hand through her side of the mist, and faded from view.

"No!" Sadie hissed. "No, no, come on!" This was a disaster. Chiron was right. This was a mistake. This was-

"This is bad," Carter whispered.

Sadie couldn't do anything but nod.

* * *

**Naughty naughty Kanes. Tsk, tsk.**

**Well, please tell me what you think, as usual. I appreciate any and all reviews, and I find them all helpful, so. Don't hesitate to ask about something or let me know if something's incorrect or anything.**

**That's all - only two chapters to go! I'll update regularly enough. NaNoWriMo hasn't become too hard yet, and I've finished this story already, so that's all dealt with. See you all in a few days, hopefully. Maybe even tomorrow, if I get a good enough response. :)**


	6. Chapter 6

**This is my shortest chapter to date, sorry all. It didn't feel right to combine it with Chapter 7.**

**In other news, NaNoWriMo is consuming my life. It's a good thing I have all of this pre-written, or I would be in deep trouble. I'm nearly at 30,000 words now, though, right on track, so that's going well.**

**I've also started the next story in this series, but of course because of NaNo it's going a bit slowly. But for anyone interested, never fear, I will post it pretty shortly after this one is finished, hopefully. Or in December, when I'm finished with my novel and I have more free time on my hands to write other things.**

**Geronimo.**

* * *

Percy found himself once again standing in the field, but this time, to his alarm, it was a bit less ghostly, and it felt more solid and real under his feet. And the people, too, who faded into view around him just as he noticed this, had more color to them, and he thought he could hear them whispering, if he really listened. That alone was enough to scare him.

However, this time instead of the man coming up to him, a blond girl about his age that reminded him a bit of Annabeth with her sharp eyes and serious expression, stepped forward to shake his hand. However, he didn't accept. She didn't, to his relief, react much.

"Um," he began, and like the last time his voice sounded strange and alien and creepy. "If you can, er, talk...who are you?"

She blinked at him then, and with a start he saw that she had become less ghostly in the space of just that one second, and so had the others, and the rest of the dreamscape. His heart skipped a beat.

"Who are you?" she asked back, intelligence lacing her words. A lot like Annabeth. She sounded sort of far away and distorted, but her voice was clearer than his.

"Uh, Percy," he replied, startled. "Percy Jackson. Who are you?"

"Astrid Ellison," she said. He noticed then that she looked half-starved, and there was a light of wariness in her eyes. "Nice to meet you." She reached for his hand again, but he pulled back.

"Uh, if you don't mind, where are you coming from? Are you even...?" _Are you even real?_

She acted like she was shaking his hand, and smiled politely at him, but she looked so shocked as she did so that he wasn't sure how to react. She didn't answer him.

Then an ice cold hand gripped Percy's shoulder and everything around him was torn apart. Astrid Ellison was the last to go, her mouth half-open like she would speak again, a curious and hopeful look on her face. Then she was gone, too, and Percy opened his eyes.

IIIII

It was two in the morning. Sadie had fretted over her and Carter's call to Bast for hours, wondering when the cat goddess would arrive, but apparently she hadn't found them yet, because there had been no signs of her arrival. Carter hadn't fallen asleep, either. He moved restlessly in his sleeping bag while Sadie stared blankly at the bunk above her and tried not to worry too much.

It wasn't working.

She didn't want to wake Percy up and tell him, not at all. He would find out soon enough, anyway. She had considered waking him a couple of hours ago, but then decided not to. If he was having an important dream about the ghosts, she didn't want to interrupt. Especially when she'd done so much wrong already. She'd only wanted to help, but...

Suddenly, she heard a sharp intake of breath, and before she could react Percy was climbing out of bed and had turned on the light. Her heart hadn't entirely settled since the ordeal with Bast, but now it was going at a hundred miles an hour again, and she understood that it wouldn't stop anytime soon.

Everything was quiet for a minute, while Percy looked confused for a moment and then glanced at Sadie. Then Carter. Then the fountain. He took in the guilty looks on their faces, and seemed to understand. His face went stony and angry.

"We're sorry," Carter managed helplessly. "She's coming for us. We don't know when she'll be here."

"You should have listened," Percy told them furiously. "Gods, we're in so much trouble." Fear flashed across his face. "You guys don't know what you could have started. Another war. We can't-"

"Neither can we," Sadie snapped defensively. "We don't want another war, either. I swear. We thought she could help, really. She said it wasn't the gods, by the way. That's a clue, anyway, right? We did something."

Percy just sighed and ran a hand through his hair. Then, he scrambled into a pair of jeans and directed them to do the same. "We need to tell Chiron," he ordered. "Right now, let's go."

Before they reached the centaur, though, Percy stopped at a dark, intimidating cabin, and rapped on the door. He didn't have to wait long for Nico to throw it open, half asleep and ticked off. "What?" the kid asked grumpily.

"They called Bast," Percy said quickly, and took the boy by the wrist. However, he managed to be gentle about it. "C'mon, we're going to Chiron."

"Getting Annabeth, too?" Nico asked, prying his wrist from Percy's grip with a scowl.

"Yeah." And they did. The girl glared relentlessly at Sadie and Carter throughout their walk to Chiron's, radiating disaproval and vague hatred. Just when Sadie had thought she'd gotten some respect around here.

They knocked on the door to Chiron's place, and none other than Rachel answered, her eyes wide and scared. "I know," she said, glancing at the Kane siblings. "Did all of you dream?"

Nico, Annabeth, and Percy all answered with yes, and she invited them inside.

"She'll be here soon," Rachel told them all as they once again sat around the ping-pong table. "We have only about an hour before she's here. She's a goddess, so we need to be prepared." She looked to Sadie and Carter. "You shouldn't have called her. We were doing just fine."

Despite herself, Sadie felt a surge of shame and tried hard not to duck her head.

"We're sorry," Carter murmured. "We don't want a fight, either."

"Besides," Sadie said, as Chiron was coming into the room, "she just wants us back. The other Egyption gods aren't even bothered by any of this. They're not awake or disturbed or anything. If we just go with her, she shouldn't do anything."

"We can't know that," Chiron said, more sharply than Sadie expected him to. She blinked. He sighed then and shook his head. "I know you meant well," he said, "but that doesn't mean it was right. You should have listened to us when we told you to wait." Rachel had obviously already told him what had gone on, however she'd known. Sadie guessed it was that prophet thing of hers.

Sadie tried to swallow, but to her shock she found a lump in her throat. "Well, fine. Sorry."

"That was ridiculously foolish," Annabeth snapped. "We might be headed into war again. And it will be your fault. No matter if your goddess friend means harm to us or not, eventually the House of Life will find out, and they will come after us. No questions asked."

Carter repeated his earlier apology.

"What are we going to do, fight her?" Nico asked. "We can't do that."

"No," Annabeth agreed, "we don't want a fight. But we want to be prepared. Just in case. Rachel, maybe you could ralley the rest of the camp, get them awake and ready for a battle. Tell them not to attack unless we are very clearly in danger."

Chiron sighed again, and made his way to the door. "I will," he offered. "And perhaps I can find Dionysus to help us."

"What about the dreams?" Rachel asked. "What all happened to you guys?"

Percy started in, explaining his encounter with the girl named Astrid, and how much more vivid the dream had been that time. The others agreed that it was strange and worrying. Sadie was sorry, for the first time, that she couldn't help. She felt absolutely rotten. She knew that she would have had to face Bast sometime, but she should have waited. She should have listened before, when they told her to hold on, wait for more information. At the same time that shame chilled her, anger burned in her veins. They were treating her like a stupid child, which she clearly wasn't. This wasn't right. This was dumb and ridiculous, and maybe it was all her fault, but...

Annabeth jumped in then, narrating a short, mostly one-sided conversation with the "ghost" of a boy with a strange scar on his forehead and incredibly messy black hair that reminded her of Percy's. Then Nico went on about his dream, and then Rachel about hers. No one, it seemed, had gained any information that was especially helpful. Sadie wanted to scream.

But instead, she just rested her forehead on the table and tried to breathe.

* * *

**Chapter 7 will be posted tomorrow or Monday, depending on the response I get. If a lot of people seem interested, it'll come tomorrow. If not, Monday. If NaNo drags me under until Thanksgiving break, when I have more time, I'll update then. So next week, at the latest.**

**Constructive criticism is appreciated, as always. I love hearing from all of you, and I appreciate any and all help and support!**

**We're almost done. I'll see you all soon.**


	7. Chapter 7

**And here we are, at the end.**

**I got an anonymus review from someone (named J) that said that they hoped I wasn't going to mix other stories into this. My response to that is: I'm sorry, but this story is one in a series, and that series involves many other fandoms. One of them happens to be Harry Potter, as some of you noted in the reviews. Another is the Gone series, where Astrid Ellison from chapter 6 is from. So J, I'm sorry about that. I'm glad you've enjoyed my story up to this point, though, and I appreciate the review and you translating your review from Portugese into English for me to read, and it's very flattering to know that you used Google Translate to read my story up until this point. :) Thank you for reading, even if you decide to abandon this story now.**

**In any case, this story has been fun to write, and it's been a joy to see the response to it. You're all fantastic. :)**

* * *

Percy soon found himself outside on Half-Blood Hill, with the rest of the camp hiding nearby behind trees and bushes and shrubs and even behind cabins farther out. Chiron had accompanied him, Annabeth, Rachel, Nico, Sadie, and Carter to the hill, where together they now stood, chilled with the potential battle looming. Sadie and Carter were especially restless, and Percy knew that they were feeling guilty. Even Sadie, though she was trying hard to act like she didn't care.

"How much longer?" he asked Rachel, who stood to his left and was staring intently across the hill.

"A few minutes," she replied anxiously, sighing. "Percy, I don't know how this is going to turn out. We could be at war by noon, or this whole thing could be over in less than an hour. I really have no idea."

"Don't stress out about it," he told her, although under the circumstances it was probably entirely okay to be terrified. "We're just going to give her Sadie and Carter and try to talk her out of killing us all. Which hopefully she isn't planning on doing anyway, but..." He wasn't helping at all. Rachel just looked more worried now. "Sorry."

"No, you're right."

Annabeth had shaken off Percy's hand earlier, but now she reached over and grabbed it, giving him a reassuring squeeze. He returned it, and thought he saw a flicker of a smile on her face before her expression was steely again. He almost smiled himself.

Then Rachel whispered, "Here she comes," at the same time that Sadie drew in a deep, very worried breath. A dot appeared on the horizon, that soon grew into a woman galloping her way toward them at speeds not humanly possible, especially not on all fours. Percy was, despite the somewhat awkward look of her, intimidated by it. And as she grew closer, she looked more fluid as she ran, and more dangerous and feline.

"Here we go," Nico muttered from Rachel's other side, just loud enough for Percy to hear him. Then, Bast was in front of them, her upper lip curled into a snarl as she carefully looked Sadie and Carter over.

"Hey Bast," Carter said weakly. "We're okay, see? They've been good to us."

The goddess stared at him, then Sadie. Then her gaze swept along the line of uneasy demigods and Chiron. She paused on the centaur.

"Hello," he said. "I am Chiron, the activities director at this camp. We wish you no harm, nor your friends. We were only concerned with the safety of ourselves. If you'll excuse me, gods are unpredictable, and the House of Life is a danger we had to consider."

Bast glared at him for a moment, but didn't respond otherwise. Percy was worried by her lack of response.

"Bast, it's okay," Sadie jumped in. "Seriously, we're fine. We literally just called to ask you about the gods. That's all. It helped us, so, thank you for that. But otherwise, er, we haven't figured much out. But we're fine! This is really the only bad thing that's happened so far."

The goddess was quiet for a moment before she said, "What is all this about ghosts?"

"Oh," Percy began, not able to be silent any longer, "we've all been having dreams where there are ghosts standing all over the place, and they try to shake our hands, but when they touch us we wake up. Just tonight they, uh, they actually talked to us a little. Not a whole lot. I mean..." His heart raced.

"And who are you?"

"Uh, Percy Jackson. Ma'am."

"And how did you come across the Kanes, Mr. Jackson?" She was brisk and angry. Percy knew that he'd have to tread carefully. His stomach twisted.

"I met them in Brooklyn," he said. "Well, I was being chased by a monster and they, um, killed it. I invited them to come with me back to camp. I didn't know, really, what would happen when I did that, but. Um. Sorry." He had never felt more stupid, he thought.

"Sadie," Bast said, "come here." The younger Kane stepped forward enough to allow Bast to look her over more closely. "You're really not hurt?"

"No! Really." Sadie was obviously exasperated. "We've been saying that the whole time, Bast. I...we're okay. This is all a huge misunderstanding."

Bast, although she still looked doubtful, was at the same time relieved. However, she didn't entirely release Sadie, whose arm she was now tightly gripping. "I don't like it," the goddess hissed. "Greeks aren't to be trusted."

"Um, we're still here," Percy began, but Annabeth jabbed him in the side and he closed his mouth.

Bast ignored him, fortunately. "Sadie, you can't stay here."

"Something's going on," Sadie said pleadingly.

"We don't want to stay here," Carter put in, and from his face and his voice he was being honest. "But we think we have to. There's something going on, and if we leave we could put all these people in danger. The House of Life could find them or something, if we ever ran into other magicians."

The cat goddess slowly shook her head. "But if you stay here too long, the scent will be almost permanently infused in you. You will be hunted by their monsters, their gods will pay attention to you, and you will die. It will take years to perform a full detox."

She made them sound like poison. Percy scowled, but held his tongue at Annabeth's warning glance and hand squeeze.

Sadie hesitated. "Well...that would be bad. Okay. But we need to stay in touch at least, if we leave. Like Percy said before, we've been having dreams."

Bast's gaze flickered to the assembled demigods and their activities director before settling back on Sadie. "You're not unfamiliar with danger," she allowed, "but I believe this would be too much, even for you. It won't be bad for a while, if you just speak to them. But then connections will be found, and you will be tracked down before you've even figured out your dreams."

"Just limited contact," Carter said. "We don't..." he glanced at Percy. "We're not really...friends...but we need to do this. We need to cooperate. And when we find out what's going on, what these ghost things are, what the dreams mean, and where they're coming from, we'll be done. Bast, please. Just wait a little longer. We'll be done by then." He was practically begging her. Percy's heart hadn't slowed yet.

"You don't know that," she snapped, but there was pure worry in her voice. "We don't know what these dreams mean, and how you're connected to these demigods. It could very well kill you, and then where would we be? We have different problems to worry about, in case you two have forgotten."

"Obviously not," Sadie mumbled, her face strained. "Give us one more day, maybe. Bast."

"Or we could talk it through now," Percy interrupted after a pause. "Talk through as much as we can, and then meet once a week for an hour after this until this is all over with. That won't be too much contact, right?" He looked to Bast, who stared at him.

Then, slowly, she shook her head. "Probably not, but we have other things to-"

"Bast," Carter chimed in, "this is important, too. Maybe it has something to do with our other problem. This could be the key to it all."

"I doubt it."

"But you don't know," Sadie said. "Come on."

Bast considered this briefly, before rounding on Chiron. "Can I really trust you with them?" she growled. "If I can't, then we will have a problem."

Chiron nodded politely. "They've been safe with us so far," he said. "And with Percy's idea, they no longer have to stay with us. That is, if you can rid them of their Greek scent." Percy's heart was pounding.

Bast looked strangely like a cat then, and Percy thought that if she had been her ears might have flicked. "It won't be very easy, but I can."

There was relief in Chiron's voice when he said, "Then are we agreed?"

The cat goddess looked them all over, even Carter and Sadie, who were looking as desperate as Percy felt. She had to agree. She had to. She hesitated, then opened her mouth.

Rachel took in a sharp breath, and stumbled backwards. "Oh gods," she whispered, and Percy was startled to note that there was a hint of hysteria in her voice.

"Rachel?" he asked, reaching for her hand. "What's wrong?"

She pulled sharply away from him, and her eyes were wide and terrified and without recognition in them. Then, she slowly seemed to remember who he was, and took his hand in her own. Her grip was icy and if he'd been mortal it would probably have hurt.

"What's going on?" Bast growled. The suspicion was back in her voice, and she clutched Sadie with a mother's protectiveness.

"You can't see them?" Rachel whispered, glancing around fearfully. A chill settled in Percy's stomach, and he felt Annabeth squeeze his hand in reassurance.

"See what?" Chiron asked gently, but his voice was guarded.

"The ghosts," Rachel breathed, borderline sobbing. Then she seemed to get a hold of herself and met Percy's eyes. "I think you will, soon." There was a faint green glow in the depths of her pupils, and he felt sick.

Then Nico uttered a Greek curse and jumped about a foot in the air. "Gods!" he shouted. "What is going on?"

"What's wrong?" Carter asked. His face was white.

"It's the ghosts from my dreams," Nico explained, his eyes serious and grim as they met Percy's. Then, slowly, figures began to fade into view. Less ghostly than they'd been in sleep, the ghosts hovered around him, milling around like regular people at a gathering, and seeming to talk. But there was no sound. Percy struggled for breath.

Moments after, Annabeth's grip on him tightened, and she seemed to be having trouble controlling her breathing. Then Sadie and Carter became aware of the ghosts, and both of their eyes widened in fear.

"What are you doing to them?" Bast demanded of Chiron.

"You heard them," he said, sounding grave and concerned. "It's not me. It's the ghosts from their dreams."

"Bleeding through," Rachel whispered, and her eyes were glowing eerily now. "Bleeding through from another world."

Bast was clearly frightened, but she snapped, "What is she going on about?"

"No idea," Percy answered her, sidestepping the ghost of a teenage girl. "They look a lot more like real people now," he remarked, trying to stay calm.

"Yeah," Nico agreed. "That's weird." He locked eyes with Rachel, who was breathing hard and whose eyes were still green. "Rachel, what do you mean bleeding through?"

She blinked at him. "Another world," she repeated. It wasn't a prophecy by far, but Percy had a feeling that was all they were going to get. "Bleeding through."

"What, like another dimension or something?" Sadie asked, her voice high with fear, although she tried desperately to hide it. "Like the Duat?"

"That's it," Annabeth breathed. "It's another dimension. Another world of people. There have been theories about other dimensions going around for ages, and your Duat," she pointed to Sadie, "proves them to be at least partially right. And there are dimensions is some Greek mythology, too. The walls between them have to be weakening or something." At Percy's questioning, confused look, she elaborated. "There must be walls seperating their world and ours, otherwise this would happen all the time." She made a wide gesture with her free hand. "So they're weakening somehow. Obviously."

"Right," he said. "Obviously."

"It makes sense," Carter agreed.

Then, Percy noticed the slow whitening of the landscape around them. "Um, guys?" he began. "What's...?"

"We're bleeding," Rachel told him.

"Chiron," Annabeth said swiftly. "Something's happening."

"Yes," the centaur verified. He was becoming harder to see, and soon it was like everything besides the assembled demigods and magicians were swathed in fog. "You're fading." He sounded far away now.

Bast was calling Sadie. Her arm was around the girl, but it almost looked like Sadie was fazing through it. "Sadie! Try to hold on!"

"I can't," Sadie hissed, grabbing desperately at the goddess' arm. "Bast, wait."

"We're bleeding," Percy murmured, looking at Rachel. "So we're going to their dimension now?"

"That must have been what was happening all along," Annabeth said quietly, still clutching his hand. Rachel had let go, and it almost looked like she was hovering. "It looked like they were coming to us, but really we were coming to them the whole time." She was starting, to Percy's horror, to sound like she was underwater, like he'd sounded in his dream. Percy remembered the flicker he'd seen during capture-the-flag. That must've been what was happening. How long had Rachel been seeing flickers? Had the others, too?

"Gods, Bast," Sadie said, and Percy knew that the goddess had completely faded. He couldn't see Chiron any longer either, and he felt a pang of regret.

Carter went to his sister, but he moved sluggishly, and when Percy raised a hand to his face it felt like he was stuck in slow-motion.

The fog whitened, and Percy realized that the ghosts were gone. The light continued to brighten, and the last thing Percy saw in the blinding whiteness was Rachel's pair of glowing green eyes. Then, they blinked out, too, and he was shot into darkness.

He opened his eyes to find himself half on top of Annabeth, who was shivering uncontrollably beneath him and looking a bit sick. Percy himself was feeling exhausted, so he didn't bother raising his head, just huffing out a breath and closing his eyes again.

There was a voice then, that instantly got Percy to roll onto his back and sit up. A voice with an accent he couldn't place with his currently scrambled brain. "Greetings. You are probably all very confused, but please be patient. You will get answers soon."

Percy fought the impulse to lay back down, and looked to Annabeth, who was now struggling to sit up. "Wh...where are we?" she whispered, so quietly Percy could hardly hear her. He could see Nico on her other side, with Sadie and Carter beside him. Rachel was on Percy's other side, staring blankly at the sky and squinting a little in the sunlight. It was sunny here, and the sky was nearly cloudless.

"My name is Artemis Fowl," the voice continued briskly, with a hint of excitement. "Welcome."

Carter sat up and looked Percy in the eye. An equal amount of worry and confusion was in both their eyes.

"What. The. Hell," an unfamiliar voice blurted.

Percy swallowed hard.

* * *

**Ah, and I get to post this scene again, except in a different point of view. This last scene where Artemis speaks is also in Only the Beginning, my other story in this series, which is a Doctor Who/Avengers crossover, if I haven't mentioned that before.**

**Anyway, I'd like to thank you all again for reading my story, and reviewing, favoriting, and following it. I appreciate everything.**

**If anyone is interested in reading the rest of this series, known as The Crossover Collection, you can check out Only the Beginning, or wait probably a week or maybe just a few days for me to get the next story up. It will be a Doctor Who/Sherlock crossover (also known as Wholock), for anyone who cares.**

**Please review this chapter as well, and tell me if there are any ways I can improve this story at all.**

**Thank you all so much again.**

**-hiholly**


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